


All the Answers Are In Cosmopolitan

by Telesilla



Series: I Only Want Your Trust [1]
Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: Alternate Universe - BDSM, Backstory, Gen, Wordcount: 1.000-3.000
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-01-30
Updated: 2011-01-30
Packaged: 2017-10-15 06:20:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,462
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/157904
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Telesilla/pseuds/Telesilla
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>At sixteen, John may or may not know what he wants, but he sure as hell knows what he doesn't want.</p>
            </blockquote>





	All the Answers Are In Cosmopolitan

**Author's Note:**

> This is just a tiny bit of sub!John's backstory. There are additional notes about the universe at the end of the story. Thanks again to the, like, totally awesome Helens78 for the speedy beta.

_July, 1983_

 

"Oh, Master, please," the girl on the screen moaned as the man grabbed a handful of her hair and dragged her over his lap. He pulled her bright red lacy underwear off and raised his hand.

"Oh. My. God!" Melissa squealed. "I am going to kill Greg!" She lunged for the remote control and hit pause.

John shifted in his seat, covered his lap with the copy of Cosmo he'd been leafing through idly and tried not to stare at the grainy close up of the guy's big hand landing on the girl's ass.

"Oh my God, guys," Melissa said as she finally managed to turn the tape off. The scene was replaced with the MTV logo, but Jason had found the TV remote and muted it. "I am, like, _so_ sorry," she went on, her face beet red.

"It's okay," John said, patting her arm awkwardly.

"Really," Melissa went on, "I'm not some big pervert. Greg told me this was soft core!"

"Oh, honey," Jason said, reaching out and pulling Melissa into his arms as she started to cry. "Greg just wanted to embarrass you in front of us. It'll be okay."

"John," Beth said, "can I give this to Melissa?" She lifted John's rum and coke off the coffee table and John nodded. Melissa's hysterics were legendary, but hopefully between the drink and Jason, she'd calm down.

Once Jason had taken Melissa up to the bathroom so she could wash her face and pull herself together, Beth looked at John.

"That was a shitty thing for Greg to do," she said.

"Greg's an asshole," John replied. "But Jesus, it was just a spanking. It's not like it was hardcore porn or anything." He flipped the magazine open to the article he'd been reading. "And anyway, it says in here that some tops like that kind of thing, and that we're supposed to be adventurous and try new things to make them happy."

Beth looked over his shoulder. "But if you let your top spank you...I mean, they won't respect you, right?"

"I dunno." John sighed and threw the magazine onto the table. "I told Dad I was thinking of going to one of those finishing schools...you know, like Academie d'Amour."

"Really?" she asked, her eyes big.

"Yeah." John couldn't help a smug little smile. "He hit the roof...told me no Sheppard was going to whore themselves out like that, and when I went into the whole _thing_ about Companions being so much more than whores and historically important and stuff, he just went off again."

"But you're not really thinking of going to a, you know, _finishing school_ , are you?" She sounded shocked and John almost yanked her chain just to see what she'd do.

"Are you kidding?" he finally said. "I'm too skinny and already too hairy, not to mention being kinda clumsy." He shrugged. "And I really don't want to do something like that, but I don't want...." He gestured at the magazine. "That. You know, the whole thing we're supposed to do. Marry some top from a good family like, I dunno, Greg or my fucking brother, and spend the rest of our lives trying to make a nice home for them."

"It's not like we're living in the '50s, you know. Married subs get jobs all the time."

"Oh, yeah? Anyone we know? I don't think anyone at school has parents who both work outside the house. And before you say it, the charity committees and museum board stuff doesn't count."

"So what do you want to do?"

John paused and looked at her. She was one of his best friends and had been his roommate at school for two years now, but he still couldn't quite tell her. Not yet.

"Go to college," he said, and it wasn't exactly a lie. "And get a _real_ degree--math or engineering--not just something interesting to tide me over until I meet the right top."

She nodded, like she wasn't at all surprised. "But you do want to get married, don't you?"

"Maybe. Eventually. But not to someone...I don't want to marry someone who wants to marry Patrick Sheppard's son. Someone who's looking for that corner office and an eventual place on the board."

"What if...I mean, will your dad let you? What if he won't pay for college?"

"I think he will, if he thinks I'll get it out of my system. And if he doesn't, there's always the trust account from Mom. And Senator Sheppard left me some money, too."

"She was still alive when you were born?"

"Oh, yeah," John said. "We even met her once when I was five and Dave was eight. She was nice to us, but _totally_ bossy, even to Dad." He laughed. "I didn't even know who she was at the time, just that she was Dad's grandma. It was kind of a surprise when we got to the 19th Amendment in social studies and I realized she was famous."

He smiled a little. "I like to think she'd approve of me using her money to get a decent education."

"Yeah." Beth nodded. She paused and then got up, heading for the mini fridge. "Have you talked to Brian about this?" she asked as she made a couple of drinks.

"Not too strong, okay?" John asked. If Beth was going to grill him about his boyfriend and his plans for the future, the last thing he wanted to do was get drunk.

"And no, I haven't said anything," he said, toying with the leather cuff on his right wrist. "We're just fooling around, not planning ahead. And anyway, he's going off to Harvard next year. It's not like we're going to keep going out when he's gone."

 _Not that he knows that yet._ The problem with Brian, aside from the fact that John's dad liked him, was that he was too nice. He opened doors and sent chocolates and took John to nice places and John was certain he would never, ever, put John over his knee and spank him. Hell, he didn't even like to tie John up.

"Well, if you're looking to get rid of him before that...." She tried to look innocent and John laughed.

"If you want to try, go right ahead."

"Aren't we supposed to have, like, a cat fight or something?"

The thought of him and Beth rolling around the floor of Melissa's parents' home theater fighting over Brian was enough to get a real laugh out of John. He clamped a hand over his mouth in embarrassment and reached for his drink.

"I like your laugh, you know," Beth said.

"Oh, please, I sound like a donkey," John said, wincing. "And people think I'll be able to make a decent marriage." Tired of talking about himself, he reached for the Cosmo.

"Huh, _What Does Your Top Want In Bed?_ Apparently the answers might surprise us."

"They always say that," Beth said. "And anyway the answer is easy--oral sex." She giggled.

John flipped through all the hair product and make up ads to the article. "Maybe that falls under Imaginative Sex?"

"What are they calling imaginative?"

"Well, let's see..."

They were still giggling over the fact that "imaginative" seemed to involve whipped cream when Jason and Melissa came back, both carrying make up boxes.

"Look," Melissa said. "I got some totally awesome neon nail polish the other day! We need to try it out."

"I don't know why you always have the cheap stuff," Jason said, rolling his eyes.

 _Because it's easier to steal from the CVS than it is to rip off Macy's,_ John thought.

"Because Wet n Wild has all the best colors, duh!" She reached out and grabbed John's hand. "What do you think, turquoise?"

"Sure, why not?" John said. If nothing else, something this tacky would annoy the hell out of his step-mother.

He couldn't really shake the faint feeling of melancholy, though. As Melissa painted his nails and Jason turned the TV back on just in time to catch the video for "Every Breath You Take," John bit back a sigh. Tomorrow they'd sleep in and then swim in Melissa's pool while her dad sunbathed and her mom went to work and then they'd probably watch movies or MTV again that night and and and....

It all stretched out in front of him, vapid and boring and empty. In thirty years he could easily be just like Melissa's dad, with the diets and the tanning and the shopping and the plastic surgery, while his spouse went off to work at Sheppard Utilities and his kids took to drinking and stealing nail polish for kicks.

 _Not me. Not. Me._

 

 _-the end-_

**Author's Note:**

> Additional Notes about the Universe: In our universe, the Nineteenth Amendment to the US Constitution--ratified in 1920--gave women the vote. In the Trust!verse, it gave the vote to subs; John's great-grandmother was one of the politicians instrumental in getting it ratified.
> 
> "Finishing Schools" are a polite term for what are basically sex schools and they range from the sleazy to high end places that are more like spa retreats with "extras." Prostitution is legal in most parts of the world--including the US and Canada--in this universe but it's considered kind of shady. I'll cover more of this when I talk about John's weekend at one of these places.


End file.
